Kabbalah: A Neurocognitive Approach to Mystical Experiences

217 Pages·2015·1.38 MB·English

by  Shahar Arzy

Kabbalah
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Kabbalah
A Neurocognitive Approach to
Mystical Experiences
SHAHAR ARZY And MOSHE IdEL
new Haven and London
Published with assistance from the foundation established in memory of Philip
Hamilton McMillan of the Class of 1894, Yale College.
Copyright © 2015 by Shahar Arzy and Moshe Idel.
All rights reserved.
This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, including illustrations, in any
form (beyond that copying permitted by Sections 107 and 108 of the U.S. Copyright
Law and except by reviewers for the public press), without written permission from
the publishers.
Yale University Press books may be purchased in quantity for educational, business,
or promotional use. For information, please e-mail [email protected] (U.S. office)
or [email protected] (U.K. office).
Set in Minion type by IdS Infotech, Ltd.
Printed in the United States of America.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Arzy, S. (Shahar), author.
Kabbalah : a neurocognitive approach to mystical experiences / Shahar Arzy,
Moshe Idel. — 1st edition.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBn 978-0-300-15236-4 (hardback)
1. Cabala—Psychology. 2. Cognitive neuroscience. 3. Mysticism—Judaism—
Psychological aspects. I. Idel, Moshe, 1947– author. II. Title.
BM526.A79 2015
296.7ʹ12—dc23
2014042891
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
This paper meets the requirements of AnSI/nISO Z39.48–1992
(Permanence of Paper).
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Contents
Foreword, by Steven C. Schachter, M.D. ix
Introduction 1
one Justification of a neurocognitive Approach to
Mystical Experiences 5
1. Four Main Approaches to Mystical Experiences 5
2. A “Bottom-Up” Approach to Mystical Experiences 9
3. Experiences, Radiations, and Cognitive Techniques 10
4. Technical Constructivism from Within the Brain:
Limitations 13
two Approaching Ecstatic Experiences 18
1. Ecstasy and the Subjective Experience 18
2. Ecstasy in Judaism 22
3. Four Basic Levels of Ecstasy in Jewish Mysticism 29
4. Four Types of Ecstatic Experience in Jewish Mysticism 30
5. Ecstasy and the Cognitive neuroscience of the Self 32
vi Contents
three The One out There: Autoscopic Phenomena in
Jewish Mysticism 35
1. Ex-Stasis: Out of the Body 35
2. Autoscopic Phenomena 36
3. Autoscopic Phenomena in Ecstatic Kabbalah 41
4. Personal Reports of Mystical Experiences 52
5. Analyzing Mystical Experiences 69
6. Autoscopic, Ascension, and Unitive Ecstasies: different Kabbalistic
Trends, different Brain Mechanisms 77
7. Conclusion 83
four The Spirit in the Brain: Trance and Possession in
Jewish Mysticism 85
1. dissociative Trance disorders 85
2. Maggid and dibbuq 89
3. The Maggid and Its Induction 91
4. Personal Reports of Mystical dissociative Experiences 93
5. Maggid, dibbuq, and the Brain 101
6. Maggid and dibbuq: Two Selves in One Person 111
Conclusions 113
1. Some Final Methodological Remarks 113
2. Ecstatic Kabbalah as a Seminal Investigation of the Human Self 116
Contents vii
appendix a. The External and Internal Worlds: Functional
networks in the Human Brain 119
1. Large-Scale networks in the Human Brain: Function and Anatomy 119
2. The External and Internal Worlds 131
3. Integration of Information in the Brain 135
4. Embodiment, Subjectivity, and Integration 138
5. Conclusion 140
appendix b. Abraham Abulafia the Mystic and His Theory
and Technique 141
Notes 147
Bibliography 163
Acknowledgments 189
Index 192
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Foreword
Steven C. Schachter, M.d.
Chief Academic Officer, Consortia for Improving Medicine
with Innovation and Technology; Professor of neurology,
Harvard Medical School
The clues to answering age-old questions may turn out
to be just as old as the questions themselves.
In this thought-provoking book, Shahar Arzy and Moshe
Idel present compelling evidence that over hundreds of years,
a group of mystics, collectively part of the Jewish Kabbalah,
mastered techniques to probe and potentially unlock the secrets
of human consciousness, mind and body, sense of self, and
ecstatic experiences.
The substantial body of knowledge given to us by Kab-
balah mystics and explored in this book complements and
greatly expands upon insights to these phenomena from other
sources. For instance, as the authors note, similar experiences
have been spontaneously reported by people in the context of
their epileptic seizures. The so-called ecstatic seizure became
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